What to do with OUR WORLD

Friends, humans, lend me your minds...just for a bit.

There is much hysteria in the news these days over the state of our world. Whether it be climate, economics, wealth distribution patterns, etc., there seems to be much hand-wringing and very little concrete, real-world, well thought-out, PLANS for how to proceed. And this lack, in my opinion, is what is at the heart of most of the anxiety behind the hysteria these days.

So, let's start a conversation about how to FIX IT. I here by suggest the hashtag #fixIt2015 for all future bits that anybody wishes to say about such things.

I would like to offer the following observations PRIOR to giving you my $0.02 worth of direction (yes, you knew it was coming)....

• Our environment is hurting. There are a number of reasons that a person can give, and here are a few of mine:
  • People seem to have decided with their pocketbook that it is easier to leave messes behind rather than to clean up after themselves. This applies to both folks using our parks (city, state, or national), as well as to big industry (ever REALLY look at what is left behind from mining, petroleum extraction, etc.)? When we place money at the center of life, it isn't hard to see why this happens, but it has at it's core the breakdown of human moral fiber.
  • Our environment is changing. Regardless of how you wish to attribute it to human use of fossil fuels, general cycles in Earth's environment, etc. is not really what I care about. The overall issue seems to be that nobody really wants to (again) spend the money to try to limit our own involvement with the environment. It is not that people are not talking about alternative energy, it is that nobody is talking about RESPONSIBLE USE of what energy we have.
• Our species, as a whole, seems to lack anything like a "long term goal" mechanism. It's all about "living in the moment" when it comes to our planet. This would be fine if we were say at the 1B total humans (or some other lowish number), but as we approach the 8-10B it is just not sustainable.
• Common Sense, Self Restraint, Personal Responsibility, and Living within your means, as concepts we build our lives around, seems to be a lost art, to say the least.
  • You cannot talk to the average teenager today and ask them to solve a problem. They don't know how. Their entire lives have been handed to them on a plate (sometimes accompanied with a "participation ribbon"). Move even two degrees off of what they know, and they are lost. We have not taught them HOW to learn common sense.
  • Self Restraint, especially when it comes to sex (oh no, we need condoms and birth control) or money (ever see their bank accounts...whatever comes in goes right out) is just a plain joke.
  • Personal Responsibility, again is very much like Self Control...a lost art. How do you take responsibility for your own actions when you cannot control yourself?
  • And Living within your means? The number of credit cards that are pushed onto young people is amazing. Enter college and you will be inundated with offers, that just further the goal of fiat currency.

Even with these few observations (and many hundreds of others that could be made here), it doesn't take long for a thinking person to decide that our world is in trouble. And still, all we do is hem and haw about it, trying to kick the can down the road saying "someone else after us will fix it."

Well, this will just not do! I do not wish to put this on the shoulders of my children, let alone our grandchildren. At the rate that our poor choices are being generated now, and with the multiplicative force of 4-7B folks doing them, the collapse of the world seems almost inevitable.

So, what can/shall we do about it? Well, to #fixIt2015, I propose several things, all interrelated to the mess I see our world in:

• I suggest we all consider conserving what energy we have/use as part of our daily lives. If you need light, don't turn on EVERY lamp in the vicinity, but rather just what you need to get the job done.
• If you are hungry, eat just what you need to survive. We in America are vastly over-fed. People around the world show us on a day to day basis that you can live on FAR LESS. Even as I struggle with this one, I recognize the truth that the less I eat, the less energy/fertilizer/pesticides/etc. are involved.
• If you are restless sitting in front of the TV watching something pointless (ie, non-educational), get up and go for a walk. Clean your house, do something ELSE.
• Minimize what money you spend. Form a budget, and stick to it. Don't really like TV (or at least all of the stupid ads), cut cable. IF you are tired of having multiple phone bills, ditch a line or two. YOU CAN CHOOSE...just do so.
• When the family car starts to go down hill, consider trading it off for a smaller, more fuel efficient USED vehicle. Cars are useless status symbols...stop pretending otherwise. An out-of-debt family is a far nicer symbol.
• Bored? Get a second job, so you can pay down your debt even faster. Got excess "stuff"? Sell it, to pay down your debt. Got a good skill? Use it to serve others who don't have that skill and make money to pay your debt off.
• Got broken appliances? Learn to fix them. Education weighs nothing, and can be valuable to you in so many ways. Go take a Vo-Tech class on electricity, carpentry, etc. Learn those skills.

One inspirational bit that got me to think about this is this TED talk by David Christian about "Big History." Try it, you'll learn something.

$1.32 - So ends eight YEARS of service...

Sucks. I just turned in the last paperwork that will finalize my relationship with my last employer. It was one of those big brown envelopes, stuffed with two copies of the final agreement. Both signed and notarized. I walked it down to the local post office (maybe 5 blocks one way).

$1.32 to mail it.

Doesn't seem like a fitting end to eight plus YEARS of service to an organization really. The hope, the projects, all of the good times. The heart ache, the annoyances, the loss of friends along the way. The big plans I had when I first hired on, hoping to retire there...HERE in my home town. Next door to my parents. Family history and family friends all around.

$1.32.

If it was $0.96, it would have been a penny per month...

No sense to it at all...

I'm geting to feel what it's like

I'm getting to feel what it's like to not have a job. Joy. I got let go yesterday.

I'll not be going into the why. I'll not be naming names. It's just a jumble right now in my head and that's where the real story is...in the jumble.

I have fond memories of doing cool things that impressed my boss.

I have fond memories of things going right.

I marvel at some of what that organization was able to do for the communities it served.

Their cast offs were better than most of what I personally had.

It was neat to be part of the team.

And that was then. Now there's just a hole left behind where most of that stuff lived. Eight plus years in size. Fifteen co-workers deep. And the funnel I have to crawl out of now is trying to pull me back into it.

Sucks really.

What is a good son to do?

I'm losing my mom. Day by day, dementia and Alzheimer's is taking her away from Dad and I. My daily interactions tell me more than I want to know. My sisters, when they show up, probably don't see it to the degree that Dad and I do. But, as of late, even they would admit to seeing it.

I and my wife just came back from next door visiting them. We moved them next door several years ago because we saw part of this coming and knew in our hearts that these days would come. I don't think either of us thought it would come on this forcefully, this quickly...

The visit was instigated by Dad, calling us on the phone after dinner in a worried, almost panicky state. He said "Can you come over? Mom wants her ear rings in and I just cannot see to do it anymore. I don't know why she needs them now, but she thinks she does." Dad, fighting macular degeneration (to the extent of being legally blind)...just couldn't deal with her. He can no longer see either her ear rings, nor her ear piercings (holes) to put the ear rings in. But mostly, I fear he doesn't see anything BUT the woman he loves, he married, and said "I do" to, so long ago, and her departure...and it is tearing him apart.

I and my wife looked at each other and went over. Dad met us at the front door. Mom was in her chair, and as my wife talked to my dad, I went over and tried to talk with my mom.

"Mom, it's getting near your bedtime. Do you really want to sleep in your ear rings? Doesn't that hurt you in the middle of the night?"

"But that way I'll be pretty in the morning," she said.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. I'd really like them in."

So, my dear wife came over and put them in for her...no big deal.

On the way out of the house, dad stops us on the front porch and relates to us on the porch that she was in bed, all of about 5 minutes from her normal time to be asleep, and she started to ask question after question:

• Where were her parents? (dead)
• Where were dad's parents? (dead)
• When was he going to get around to marrying her? (51+ years ago)
• ...and on and on...

This had a sincere undertone of grief that really struck me at the time (and as I started to write this blog post). Once my sadness abated a bit, I started to ask some hard questions:

• As Alzheimer's is hereditary, am I seeing a foreshadowing of my own future?
• Will I be stuck doing the same to my sweet wife?

Minimalism as a Strategy for Survival

In several other posts, I've mentioned that I believe in a moderated form of minimalism.  Not to the extreme of the 100 Thing Challenge, but I do believe that owning less "stuff" and, in a sense, cherishing it more makes sense to me.  As I've told my kids, "if a fire or tornado occurred today and we lost everything, the items on your lists would be the first things we'd try to replace."  That level of focus is what drives my minimalism.

In looking over my personal list, these are the everyday items that:

• I use often
• I have actually spent money to "upgrade" (as and when I found something of a better quality than what I had, I'd sell the old one, and buy the new one)
• That I see the need for the in my daily life and actually value having for myself, rather than borrowing/renting it.

I consider all such things to belong on my "valued items list," which is, and probably always will be, a work in progress.

However, I would like to mention that it plays into the current "prepping" culture also.  On the web, in books on Amazon.com, etc., you can find all manor of suggestions about "prepping", ranging from:

• Preparing for a short term natural disaster (typified by the 72-hour "Bug Out Bag" concept)
• Longer term food/famine disaster
• Ultimate demise of the world-wide economic systems (typified by the "Survivalist Farm" concept)

I have no problem endorsing the "bug out bag" as valuable concept, especially here in Tornado Alley (in fact it's just about that season again as I write this), but being knowledgeable about both ends of the spectrum can hardly be considered a bad idea.

As such, I do have a "bug out bag list" that is, much like my "valued items list" a work in progress.

As I compared these two lists, I discovered that they gave me a remarkable focus on defining what all is necessary for my life.  Furthermore, as I continue develop these two lists, I have found that items from one can serve a good use on BOTH lists.  This allows me to move towards a more self-sufficient life, as well as a more compact one. 

I hope these two lists will merge down to an easily transportable set of "things" that would allow me to live, in my retirement, or as needs demand, pretty much anywhere.

A case for being knowledgable

It's been a while.  A LONG while, no doubt.  Many things have changed, both for me and my family.

First off, fear has been growing about the state of the world, our country, and our very safety over this election season.  The more bickering and general discontent between the parties, the less and less of the "big things" seem to get done.  The whole ideas of:

• Compromise: the art of getting something CLOSER to ideal (incremental improvements)...rather than just saying "if I don't get my way, you don't get yours either"
• Working for the people AND THEIR GENERAL WELL BEING (...a government by the PEOPLE, and for the PEOPLE...sound familiar?)...rather than just to get reelected.
• Working towards becoming more of a steward of the planet...rather than a corporate consumer of the planet.
• Acknowledging that the world, and it's various groups, all have their OWN INALIENABLE RIGHTS to rule themselves as THEY SEE FIT...so long as they don't bother us, we shouldn't be bothering them.

Many of these sorts of things have lead to a sense that the world, as a whole, is simply on the verge of becoming a very fearful place.  Without some of these things getting fixed, many reasonable people simply have a fear for the future.

....SO...

Given a fear, how do you combat it?  How do you effectively deal with a fear so it doesn't consume your every waking thought?  Various groups would have you approach it from different sides, each according to their own core beliefs:

• Religious folks would say "pray for all of us, that we may survive the coming strife"; putting faith first...while arming themselves up with guns, ammo, and whatever else they thought they might need.  In short, hoard up stuff for themselves (and maybe their like minded neighbors) to survive and wait.  They seldom care about gaining the knowledge of a larger and larger community.
• Consumerist say, "Nothing is really going to go on...and if some war does spring up, that's typically good for the economy"...which history has proven it is.  Good for jobs, good for innovation, good for pocket books (at least of the rich).  Never mind the poor are usually the ones who end up in Arlington National Cemetery as the easiest "boots on the ground" to put against any opposition.
• Extremest would tend to say, "arm up, get your survival farm planted NOW, and if you don't have or cannot get one in the ground in the next 60 seconds, buddy up with someone else who has one"...really a throw back to some of the isolationist thinking of the 1900's.  They have no interest in allowing the "outsider" to join them, under any circumstance, for fear of the unknown.
• Typical folks walking about the streets don't like to think in this area, because THINKING is just way too scary.  "What do you mean, the grocery store only has about 3 days of food on hand at any one given time?  They'll just get more"...this is about as deep as these folks go.  Kind of like ostriches, they just want to put their head in the sand and pretend they are hidden and will therefore not be affected by these sorts of events.

Given all of this background, and thousands of other snippits I've read over the last few years, I would like to promote an idea that does seem to help me greatly in these trying times:

I think it important for every person to be knowledgeable, in as many areas as possible, about what is important to them.  Such things as:

• If you enjoy eating, know about farming, gathering and hunting in your area.
• If you enjoy drinking safe water, know about purification methods.
• If you have no desire to be stolen from, know about self defense, both hand to hand, and long range.
• If you wish to know about communication systems, become an amateur radio operator.
• If you wish to know about keeping your information both yours and private, learn about cryptography.
• If you don't like being sick, learn about those methods of medicine that do not require a doctor.
• But most importantly, if you like surviving, build a community. 

This last bit is the one that is really the hardest of the bunch.  You see, many great thinkers of the past have come up with the golden adage "You can never know everything."  I'm a firm believer of this.  There's just too much to know to really do a good job of it.  This has lead our modern world to focus on the development of specialties in the work force (know some small part of the whole machine, but know that part well and truly in depth).  What is not said is that if you cannot know everything, and therefore you need folks with diverse specialties, you need  a COMMUNITY of folks working together to get anything meaningful done. Whether it be in the form of a church group, civic group, or just a bunch of folks in your neighborhood, we all need communities...NOT the rugged individualist.

Even in natural strife events (tornadoes, hurricanes, earth quakes, etc.), a sense of community comes out of the woodwork to help those in need.  It is THERE, but just hidden, maybe just DORMANT, until it is needed.  And, if you review the overall sense of community several years after such a strife, it will still be spoken of in hushed terms, least it vanish completely.  But the people who went thru such things, know it is there...and are in utter awe of what happens when it reveals itself.  This is the true strength of any nation;  How well it deals with strife.

The mindless mob mentality may well win various battles in any given strife, but the knowledgeable communities can hold the real wealth...KNOWLEDGE...and it cannot be seen or singled out easily.  Knowledge cannot be stolen, broken, or vandalized by the mob.  And in the end, the sharing of knowledge is really the only "coin of the realm" that will never go out of circulation.  If more people could see their way clear to this end point, there would be less evil in the coming strife.

The World, My Life, And The Kids

Has been a while, sorry about that.  Things have been a bit on the crazy side.

I think I've said (somewhere) that we gave up cable TV a while back.  Well, my daughter gave us a "Roku" box (basically a NetFlix set-top player) for Christmas...and I think it's pretty much negated whatever "extra time" I thought we might get by not having live TV in the house.  Hence, at least a portion of, why I've not been on here.  We've been watching old movies, TV series, etc.

This, like so many things, is both bad and good.  We've wasted lots of irreplaceable time watching old things.  Guilty as charged.  But not all old things are bad things.  Take for instance:

• Cosmos, you remember, the old Carl Sagan 13 part show about the nature of the universe.  Pretty good stuff...even for as old as it is.  Nothing too far out of wack, with the exception that the major pain point now is the environment and terrorism.
• Connections, the old James Burke show, along with it's follow ons, Connections 2, and The Day the Universe Changed.  WONDERFUL stuff here.
• Tapped, a relatively new show that somehow never played here in Oklahoma...at least that I know of.  It's all about the evils of bottled water, how stupid it is to pay so much for something so unregulated, in containers that are unsafe, made by polluting the environment and killing people near the plastics plants, all for something that we can get out of our municipal taps for next to nothing.  Very reminiscent of The Story of Stuff.

The best part of these sorts of shows being available to our family was that I was able to get MY KIDS to watch them.  This has given us time to discuss the importance of the issues raised, and has given us various thoughts as departures for our own conversations on things.

Yes, there were lots of older movies that we watched recently (Red Sonya, Dr. Who, etc.) that simply brought back some warm fuzzies from my youth.  But there were a number of good things too.  After watching some of this stuff, it encouraged I and one of the boys to go bike riding.  Not just to go out and have a good time, but ALSO to save on fuel while doing something good for ourselves.

Maybe the Roku isn't bad after all.